Read Hunter Legacy 11: Home Is Where the Hero Is Online
Authors: Timothy Ellis
Hunter Legacy 11: Home Is Where the Hero Is
Home is where
the Hero is
By Timothy Ellis
The Hunter Legacy, Book Eleven
Copyright © 2016, by Timothy Ellis
This book is a work of fiction. The names,
characters, places and events are fictional and have no relationship to any
real person, place or event. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, is
purely co-incidental.
The author has taken the liberty of using
some recognizable names in a historical context or projected into the future as
if such entities survive into the timeframe of this work of fiction. Such
references are intended solely as a tribute to the entity so used and all such
usage has an intended deep respect. The author has also deliberately chosen
names for characters in tribute to the science fiction genre in all forms of
media. Some may be obvious, others won't be. There is no implied connection,
other than what the reader may make for themselves.
The author is Australian and the main
characters in this book are of Australian origin. In Australia, we colour things
slightly differently, so you may notice some of the spelling is different.
Please don't be alarmed. If you do suffer any discomfort, please take it out on
the nearest pirate.
All Rights Reserved. No part of this book
may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any manner whatsoever without the
written permission from the author except in the case of brief quotation
embodied in critical articles or reviews.
It was good to be home.
They say home is where the heart is, and my
heart was on BigMother, but I’d grown up on Galactica, and she was a little
ahead of us, leading the way to Gaia.
I'd just dropped the bombshell about where
we were, and sat back down. I closed my eyes and slipped into meditation mode,
grin still plastered on my face.
Home. Safety. No-one to shoot at me. Bliss.
The last few months had been tough. In
fact, it had been a long year, even though we'd time jumped over some of it. I
guess I looked as exhausted as I felt. But the Door had opened, we'd made it on
time, and now I could get the answers to a lot of previously unanswerable
questions.
"HUD and navmap updated," said
Jane.
"Tell everyone what you see
Jane."
"Missiles," she said. "Lots
and lots of missiles."
It took a moment to sink in. Meditation
mode expired in a flash.
"What?"
If it was possible to double take with your
eyes closed, I did a double take. I opened them, and shot Jane a look so fast,
my neck hurt.
She indicated the navmap. It had a
seriously big yellow spot.
"BLOODY HELL!" I yelled.
I think everyone else was stunned, as the crowded
Bridge was otherwise dead quiet.
"Where are they aimed, and how long to
impact?"
"Us and Galactica. First wave are a
minute out."
"Mosquitos."
"Confirmed."
I had a quick flash of a middle aged
oriental man in a red uniform jacket yelling "Shields!" I honestly
never understood why the shields on those old shows were always down, and
someone had to yell to get them up in time. Drama I guess. Adds to the danger
quotient. Highlights the obvious.
Get a grip!
"Tactical," I snapped, instead.
The nav map expanded to show only us and
the vector the missiles were coming in on, and the first of the Mosquito
launches heading outwards.
There seemed to be three different launch
points, but no ships or stations for them to come from. And so far, there were
three distinct waves coming at us.
"Move us alongside Galactica. If any
get through, I want them hitting us. Dance us around if you have to."
"Disco mode engaged."
There was half a chuckle from somewhere,
but I didn’t bother to look.
"All fighters launch," I said into
ship coms. "Target missiles, but stay out of my line of fire."
Lacey's voice could now be heard barking
orders, and the fighters spat out of the launch tubes as fast as they could go.
The 266 Privateers were also launching. We might have been heading into where I
thought was safe, but Lacey's pilots manned their ships before every jump. We'd
had enough surprises to learn that lesson by heart. So launching took seconds,
rather than minutes.
"Group Captain, seek out the
launchers. Disable but do not destroy unless absolutely necessary."
"Roger that."
About a dozen missiles made it through the
first Mosquito firing, mainly because of the lack of warning, and the delay as
more than half of them had to loop around the ship first. Nine of them crashed
into our shields. The other three hit Galactica. Her shields went down to
twenty percent. Ours to ninety percent.
"Hard hitters," said Jane.
"They're packing more of a wallop than the capital ship missiles we've
been accustomed to. And they seem to be able to travel further as well. They're
something new."
"Launch the Hives. They're to protect
Galactica at all costs with IR's and guns."
"Launching."
The second wave was incoming now. A fourth
wave had launched. It showed exactly where they were coming from. But there was
nothing there except some asteroids.
Asteroids. The word echoed about my head
for a few moments. I turned to Annabelle.
"General, please take those missile
asteroids."
"My pleasure. Colonel, saddle
up."
Jack and the team jumped up and ran out.
"George?" I said.
"Boss?"
George as usual, was in the Captain's chair
on the Bridge of Custer, docked above and behind us. He more or less lived
there now. It made launching the ship much faster than if he'd needed to run
with the troops.
"Troops on the way. Lock in where
those missiles are coming from, and be prepared to drop troops to each
one."
"Locked and loading."
The next wave of missiles landed their last
three on our shields.
I looked around to see who was still here. British,
American, and Canadian Brass; Carter, Jill, and Amy; Slice, Eric, and Jessie; Bob
and David; Greer, and Miriam. The latter two looked like they regretted leaving
their ships behind. Grace had gone off with the troops. Melissa was sitting there,
looking like she'd like to be in on the action. But she wasn’t military, and
had no combat training I knew about.
"Ever flown a Dropship Melissa?"
I asked her.
My tone was conversational, as if nothing
untoward was going on.
"No, but I did try a simulation a
couple of times."
"How'd you do?"
BigMother shifted drastically, and a couple
of missiles hit our shields instead of Galactica's.
"The same as your first time,"
she laughed. "Nothing bigger than a finger left after."
I laughed with her.
Eyes attached to stars sat there looking at
us as if we were crazy. I was unique among this group. Three and four stars
rarely commanded anything directly. They gave orders, and someone with command
rank rather than flag rank actually made things happen. Bentley was a two star,
but this wasn’t her ship. It was mine, and although I had four stars on my
shoulders, I was also this ship's Captain. So they had nothing to do, except
watch, and critique my performance. I turned my attention back to what was
going on.
A fifth wave was incoming now, but it was
reducing in number very rapidly.
"Dropship away," said Grace,
followed by Custer's other two Dropships about ten seconds apart. I hadn't even
noticed Custer had launched. But I didn’t need to. My people knew their jobs.
If Grace had dropped, she had a full load of troops, a target, and George's go
order.
I opened a channel to Galactica.
"Galactica, run for the Orbital as
fast as you can. I've got your back."
There was a moment of silence, as if her
captain, my father, was trying to figure out how to reply.
"Yes Admiral," answered someone I
didn’t know.
Galactica put on some speed, and I nodded
to Jane. She turned us head on into the next wave of missiles, while at the
same time, keeping us between them and Galactica.
Between the Mosquitoes, Point Defense
turrets, and the IR launchers, those which made it past the fighters were
picked off, with only an odd missile hitting us. Our shields held, regenerating
enough between hits. Without the Mosquitos though, we'd have been in serious
trouble. Just as well whoever was shooting at us, didn’t know about them.
"How many are there in each
wave?" I asked Jane.
"Twelve hundred."
Someone at the back wolf whistled.
The last of the fifth wave died just short
of our shields. The sixth was incoming, but was a third less than before. We
were lessening the distance all the time now.
"Objective secured," said Amanda.
"There's no-one here. It’s a major facility, but appears to be fully
automated."
There was a short pause, during which a
single missile from the sixth wave hit us.
"Objective secured," said Jack.
"Ditto."
The seventh wave launched with only a third
of the originals.
"Sorry," said Sam. "We just
missed stopping the last launch. Objective secured. Also no-one here."
"I have control of all three launcher
sites now," said Jane. "But they will require some repairs before
being used again."
The last of the missiles died out in space.
I nodded to Jane, and she sent the salvage droids out to clean up.
"Colonel?"
"Sir?"
"Leave combat droids in each facility
in case someone tries to take them back, and come on home."
"Roger that, on way."
I turned back to Jane.
"Get some tugs in here, and send those
launch asteroids to the shipyard. We need to study them. As soon as Galactica
is docked, send the Hives out to cover the entire system." She nodded.
"I don’t know where a battle fleet's worth of missile launchers came from,
but we better make damn sure there aren't any more. For all we know, pirates
found this system years ago, and are still hiding out here. As far as I can
remember, no-one has ever thought it likely we got found, so the system has
never been checked. Do the check."
"Confirmed. Comnavsats?"
"Yes, cover the whole system. No more
shocks."
The latter was said generally. More for
upstairs than anyone else I guess. Or you could say it was in the nature of an
affirmation. No more shocks. I won't say my nerves were shot from the
continuous attacks on us since we left down spine, but all the same, I was
aware my reactions to new shocks were not as good as they should be. But I
really hadn't expected to be attacked at home. And I sincerely hoped that was
the last shock I was going to get for a good long time.
Clapping came from the back of the Bridge.
I turned to see the Brass applauding. My eyebrows rose.
"Nicely done," said Bigglesworth,
who was senior.
"Thank you sir."
"Now perhaps you'd like to tell us
where we are, and who was shooting at us."
I sighed.